I’m making $19/hour working for my local housing agency. Of course, I don’t think I could physically handle the work your Blueberry is doing.
huh, y’all offer food to your cats?! mine just walk up and take it off my plate. i would have to lock them in a different place to keep them away. they circle like furry sharks, with a tasting attack every now and again.
this weekend i worked on the utility closet/cat bathroom. pulled everything out and put it back in an organized fashion. even getting rid of some things, it still looks a bit junky. i need to get a new shoe organizer for the door. some of the pockets have holes in them.
best organization tool, putting a shoe organizer with the little pockets on the back of the door for easy grab and go for cleaning/ fixing/ misc items.
I had a similar problem when I moved here. Turns out, new shower heads specially designed to maximize water pressure are 1a.) relatively inexpensive, 2b.) available at every hardware syore and most big boxes, and 3c.) easy enough to install that even my inept ass pulled it off the very first time.
SOOOO worth it.
Longer than standard hoses are also readily available at Home Depot, etc. yes, yes, it’s just one more damned thing. But that’s just part and parcel of moving into a new residence. Along with replacing all the old dim lightbulbs, putting down new shelf liners in the kitchen, etc., etc., etc. Vexing but surmountable. Just too damned many of them. Waay too damned many.
Welcome back, Sari!
It helped that 2 of us were driving and that it wasn’t for pleasure - there was an urgency to the trip. It wore me out, but with luck, we’ll never have to drive out there again.
Laundry is done. Tobias is entertaining Grandpa. Two more hours till I have to leave to get Roxy. Supper will be veggies - little red spuds, baked cauliflower parmesan, and steamed broccoli. Soooo healthy! But mostly easy. I need easy today. I need our vacation - C’mon January!!!
Started Typing: 11:40 AM ET
Clicked Reply: 1:45 PM ET
Aside from some minor work annoyances – and still feeling slightly sinus-y – it’s been an alright day so far. Weather-wise the sun is out, and it finally stopped being windy. Right now it’s 62°F with just a light breeze, and an expected high of 69. Not quite warm enough to have the windows open, but highs are supposed to be in the upper 70s/low 80s from tomorrow through Sunday: open windows, ahoy! Eventually autumn will settle in properly, but I’m alright with a slight delay as long as the leaves change (which they have).
Last night I got an email from this evening’s “Women in Leadership” happy hour (HH) organizer, and learned a new acronym: “KBYG” was in the subject line, and I had to Google it to figure out it means “know before you go.” I’ve spent the last 30 years as a writer and editor in the defense contracting industry, which means I’ve been exposed to/know a lot of acronyms: it was both kind of annoying and kind of refreshing to run across a new one!
At the moment, I’m planning to attend the HH. I really should go to things like this from time to time, and the venue is only 10 minutes from home. The advertised event timeframe is 5:30-8:30pm, but I have a feeling that might be a bit optimistic…I’m hoping there will be enough activity to keep me occupied until 8pm, which is the earliest I’ll want to head to DC. If needed, though, I can kill time by grabbing dinner somewhere before heading downtown.
Ugh, I’ve had several interruptions since starting this; it’s now ~1:20pm. Stupid day job. 
I got weirdly hungry mid-morning so I ate something, and it threw me off my normal lunch schedule. I’m just now starting to feel hungry again. Who knows what having lunch this late will do to my dinner schedule…good thing there will be food at both of my things this evening, so I can easily eat whenever I feel like it.
Holy oxymorons, Batman!
My heart truly breaks for her. At 82 she lost both her husband and her home suddenly (she can’t live alone, so her daughter took her in; the daughter and my other cousins had to sell the house), so she’s had quite a bit of emotional and logistical upheaval on top of the dementia and mobility and vision issues. Remarkably she is upbeat more often than not, but the bad moments can get pretty bad. No one blames her at all, though it’s hard on all involved. My cousins are doing the best they can; it’s just a terrible situation.
Oh, that wasn’t the decision (and never would be!): it was networking + 9pm show OR no networking + 7pm show. 
So pretty!
I often laugh at myself when I’m at the gym, because both knees and one shoulder tend to crunch. No pain, just noise.
Woot! 
Ugh. 
HA! 
That’s what I use in my bathroom: there’s no medicine cabinet or other storage (other than a little space under the sink that’s taken up by TP, trash can liners, and my hair dryer), and there is limited counter space, so years ago I got one of those shoe organizers (with clear pockets) to hold all of my hair/grooming stuff. Works perfectly. 
I also got a plastic corner shelf to help expand the counter space.
Typing from the driveway. I am sitting just inside the garage in my beat up but amazingly comfortable old desk chair. My OKJ smoker is putting of a thin blue hickory scented smoke with a ten pound (4.5 kilo) pork shoulder in the barrel. I have my trusty Macbook and an icy cold Modelo.
Maybe the definition of at least one of my happy places.
The pork shoulder will be pulled pork for my annual trip to North West Arkansas Thursday morning to another of my happy places, waist deep in the White River with my four weight fly rod in hand.
It is good to be retired
I greet you from my throne at Trash Panda HQ, where I am teaching the adoring masses to sing our new national anthem, “We’re So Jelly of Nellie.” OK, kidding. I remembered to employ the deadbolt.
A raccoon story: About 6 years ago, when I was still driving, son and wife and I went camping on the Oregon coast. I kept my keys in a pocket in the tent wall. Their big, goofy dog shared the tent, and sometime in the night rolled onto my keys, thus opening my car’s trunk, where all the food was stored. It was a raccoon orgy. They chewed right through the graham cracker box. Granola was strewn about like confetti. And the entire loaf of DIL’s banana bread was gone, plastic wrap and all. I like to think they hauled it off on their shoulders.
As I said, I like bats, but when I was little, there was an old wives’ tale about them making nests in your hair, so if I were near any, I’d put my hands over my head.
My, that’s a gorgeous candle, shoe! Wow. Have you ever made sand candles?
Yaaay! Sari’s back!
She’s a chump who won’t change, so sounds about right.
So you’re headed to metal mouse’s neck of the woods? Rocket City Trash Pandas
After 2 years of it, the last two hours are still kicking my butt.
Do you have Sonic up there? They sell ice by the bag and it’s the good stuff.
lucky, your cookies sound delish!
Irked (suckitude at its finest) , came home, walked the dog, et and am talking to Sis. Not a lot shaking at CasaRoja.
Stay safe and healthy y’all!
Up from naptime. I’m having a Manhattan, and watching hockey. the usual Redneck Stirfry for dinner tonight. If you want a Redneck Stiffy, y’all got to go down to swampy’s neck of the woods:
Unzipping bags on a conveyor? I think you’d do that well. shoving 70lbs. electric lawnmowers onto belts 6 feet above the floor on the sort aisle is a little tougher.
I ended up teaching Spot to sit for a bite or two, just to avoid having a chonky cat standing on my fork arm.
Also, Zaxby’s. I’m lucky, one of the machines at work makes massive quantities of the good ice. For free.
Howdy Y’all! Laundry got laundered. Nappage and day drinkin’ were achieved. Sup got fixed and et and the kitchen cleanded. Such as the life of retired drains on society.
Nellie glad you are not Queen of Trash Pandas. Laughed a lot at the trash panda story however.
Evenin’ all.
Had a mostly slothful day then did my planning & packing for tomorrow. I used to tell people you really only need 2 things to travel: a passport and a Visa (card). With those two you can get whatever else you need along the way. We’ll see how well I’ve predicted the clothes & accessories for our widely varying mission.
Her Ladyship went out to early dinner / cocktails nearby with a lady from my/our old condo, and I walked over to a different eatery for wings & salad. We’re now both home and readin’ and internettin’
Tomorrow I’m up a bit after 5am to leave the house a bit before 7am. I’m taking the train to the airport, so will have time to badger y’all.
Yaay for Nellie having survived the Trash Pandas. All y’all others seem to have gotten through the terrible two’s-day mostly unscathed.
Evening all. Soccer has been practiced for the last time with the littles. Let them play a few fun games and showed off some of the stuff I’ve picked up over the years (the sword was a big hit, but they weren’t allowed to touch). Also got about 600 calories sweated off at the gym, so while I have consumed more than I ought, it’s still good.
doggio, I really though that was a mis-spell; I am impressed you folks handle that sort of stuff. Spent a summer helping deliver furniture, not a job that I would like to have.
Sari, good to see you around these parts again. House-moving is stressful at the best of times, just keep taking it one step at a time and it’ll get done. Sounds like Sah-Son has done well. Never had jury duty once in all my years, don’t know why not.
Oopsie, glad you got both work and play arranged.
hippie, I envy you your happy place; I’m not sure I have one, and if I do sitting there would just cause me to want to start moving around. Glad for you and good luck fishin’.
Yep, that’s their name, lot’s of merchandise around here if anyone wants a Trash Panda cap/shirt. Never been to one of their games, however, just not a big baseball fan.
Pilot, safe travels.
OK, have conspicuously consumed so need to do the evening internettin’ and maybe some puzzle solving before bedtime. Take care all.
Big rain today at irk. Our building used to be the printing press for a large, local newspaper and that printer area is used to work on the vehicles the business uses. The doors are almost always open. Our break room is just off of this area with the open doors. So naturally, we have visitors of the critter variety. Today, I frightened two voles who were sheltering from the rain. But I haven’t seen any bats there yet. The space is probably to bright during the day for them. I wonder if our resident bed bugs originally came to the space via bats when it was vacant. Hmmm.
I’ve worked 4 10-hour days before, for insurance customer service. It was worth the long days to get an extra free day each week. This job will actually be 3 11-hour days and one 5-1/2 hour day. I’m thirty years further down the pike since I last had the regular long-hour schedule so I think this one will be more difficult. But hey, one of the customers called me ‘honey’ today so that makes up for everything. /sarcasm w laughter
shoe, those are lovely, peaceful colors.
I’ve never heard of this technique for making froth but my mother used her kitchen mixer to do it and the result was divine. But not divine enough for her to do it again. She said it took several cleaning efforts to make the beaters usable for food again. And don’t mess up because hot wax can land everywhere.
boo, may the seasonal cold gremlins pass you by without stopping. Perhaps the chili will help.
Cookie, you can’t eat a Mayslacks with your hands. Fork and knife are a must. And, yes, way too big. Good choice to visit the Arboretum. It is beautiful there at any time of year.
Nice to see you are back, sari. I hope that the case of the chills is over for you and doesn’t return. Sounds like much moving progress has been made. Replace that shower head/hose, there’s plenty to choose from these days. And perhaps you need a separate table for Adam. A taller one.
Hippie, we’ll all be over to taste some of that pulled pork!
Enjoy taking a trip that isn’t for irk, pilot!
Catch all y’all at the far end of tomorrow.
Oh, I’m familiar with them. Closest one is 30 miles away, though.
Got to work and started sneezing like crazy, constant runny nose too. Just out of control, which really sucks when you’re making other people’s food.
Got home, swearing I’d take Benadryl … and before I took any, I felt better. Something at work (airborne flour perhaps?) was really setting me off.
Grr.
Anyway, I have some Dumb Soup nukulatin’ - chicken broth with finely minced carrot and a bit of celery, plus mini farfalle and some couscous, and garlic.
A dash of Maggi and a hit of powdered poultry seasoning. Shortly, some shredded chicken and chopped green onions will go in.
I have a bunch of stale bread (I love to soak big chunks of it in soup) plus “real” croutons.
Already smells good!
Snacking on Triscuits with random toppings (cheese, butter w/chili crisp are current faves) as an appetizer.
That soup was gooo-oood!
Weirdly, I also wanted a nice hot cuppa. I’m not even chilly or anything, but had an almost overwhelming craving for tea. Was very glad I made it, too - for some reason, boiling certain dried leaves and sipping the resultant dark liquid
just hits the spot.
I can’t imagine how the first human hit upon the idea, but bless 'em for it, whoever they were.
Now, a few dark chocolate non pareils for dessert. They’re delicious but incredibly sweet - just a few go a long way.
Monkey got some gooshy-food, which only briefly distracted him from howling plaintively by the door.
The wind is also howling tonight and the trees are rustling loudly.
The day was warm and clear, with a brilliantly blue sky and a stunning sunset. So nearly everyone was in a particularly good mood.
I’m winding down by candlelight now … it’s not quite midnight and I’m already sleepy! Why, that’s almost Normal-People schedule!
… aw dammit, I just sneezed.
Anybody got some good food recommendations for Lawrenceville NJ? I’m about to pack up a bunch of stuff for delivery tomorrow. Then a a full 4+ hour drive down, off load and drive back. If’n there’s someplace good for fud…
in the 3d grade, we made johnnycakes on a real sterilized hoe and my teacher’s hibachi grill using an old colonial recipe when we learned about Valley Forge… they were good but we could see where you could starve to death while eating them lol
AWWWW! Look at him on is tippy toes, so cute!
That’s the same response MY mother had the one time she tried it, LOL!
I remember doing those as well.
I really hadn’t thought about those days in like forever until I saw shoe’s latest candle and thought some sea foam would be simple to do. Then it all came flooding back.
Mom was pretty amazing, she had three pre-schoolers at the time and despite letting her oldest (me) melt wax over a gas burner and hand the pan off to my younger sisters for pouring, none of us got badly burned. We all got burned once in a while, but those were just little owies that didn’t even blister.
Pain is a good teacher.
Oh, please tell me kitty survived the experience. I banned candles decades ago just because I read a horrible account of a long haired kitty dying due to strutting around a candle.
I’m glad you will be making money. It’s good to know that management is on your side. Kinda.
How are your planters doing? Or have they all gone to sleep already? I’m still getting cherry and Roma tomatoes but I’m fairly sure that won’t last much longer.
You will need at least two more wall transformer things than you pack. Just so you know.
How did they work out? I’d lift an eyebrow at 300F too.
Dang you guys, stop getting sick!!!
Poor kitttah has experienced slaves who have learned over the years to NOT start feeding their feline overlords people fud if they don’t know what it is. He can stand with flat back feets and reach halfway across our kitchen island, we don’t want him serving himself while we are cooking.
You sound like me with cheap chocolate! Which is why we haven’t bought candy for the Trunk or Treat yet. I want to be sure the little monsters get some.
I’m so glad to hear from you. Moving sucks and trying to do it when you are sick sucks even more.
You raised a very good man, you should be very proud.
Bats get a bum rap when it comes to rabies, only about 1% of bats carry them. I’m actually thinking about GG needing rabies shots because we have racoons as well as bats and I think it is more likely that he will be exposed by racoons than bats despite being confined to a lattice covered catio.
Our Tai Chi classes are held in a nice quiet library meeting room. The pops and crunches during warm-up are very audible.
You have said before how much you enjoy doing this, I’m so glad you have friends to help make your happy place even happier.
Well, dang. I had several cow-irkers quit because they couldn’t adjust to 4-10’s either and I felt sorry for them too. But our bodies know what they want, sometimes we can’t do anything about it.
YOU, stop sneezing! (it’s probably just the last of the allergen working its way out of your system)
We never made Johnnycakes, but I pretty much figured out at a very young age that if I had to make acorn flour to survive…I wouldn’t last the fall, forget about the winter.
This morning I found a notice from Amazon that we had ordered a stand mixer. How did this happen? Well, hubs had noticed that I had been looking at them (the disadvantages of a shared jungle account) AND that I won’t make meringue because our little hand mixer can’t handle it. I think he also noticed the Divinity recipe and wanted to facilitate my candy making.
It isn’t the KitchenAid I would have chosen, but my choice would have been made due to growing up using that brand. I will be using an Instant Stand Mixer and feel some brand loyalty to the Instant Company, I’m pretty happy.
Except we don’t have enough counter room for a new appliance.
I really do love him and I know he was trying to do something nice, but this is going to be a bother I wasn’t ready to deal with right now.
Oh well…I am finally going to get a stand mixer and that’s pretty awesome!
Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN ‘Tis 59 Amurrkin out and mostly clear with a predicted high of 79 and mostly N.O.S. This mornin’ we shall procure provisions. Beyond that we shall be our usual slothful and useless selves. Sup shall be chili/cheese/onion/slaw dawgs with oven fries. Fartfest to follow.
sari glad you’re feelin’ better and that more house movin’ has been accomplished. Yay for sah-son steppin’ up!
JtC you know you will enjoy that stand mixer, right? I lurve my KitchenAid mixer. In these days of climate controlled abodes divinity can be made year round. No more need to wait for a cool, clear, dry day.
Hippie and Pilot enjoy your trips.
Now I need more caffeine and to feed rumbly tummy. Then, alas and bother of bothers, I suppose I must needs purtify and don attire acceptable for bein’ amongst the great unwashed. Woe is me!
Happy Hump Day Y’all!